Tuesday, December 29, 2015

In years past, I've written about my top projects of the year. Sometimes the projects have been as big as completely remodeling rooms in my house; sometimes they've been as small as creating a simple craft. But always there have been projects.

This year has included a few projects for me, but mostly it's been a year of events.

2015 has been a different kind of year: fewer projects and more upheaval.

Yes, I think that's the right word. 2015 has been a year of upheaval, a year of change in our family. The changes have been good, but they seem to have taken all my energy.

As I've reflected on this past year, I realize that I've just allowed myself to be swept along by all these events, kind of waiting to see where I would wash up.

The danger with that approach, of course, is that one can simply become washed up.

Washed up is not what I want to be, and I realize that the only person who can fix that is me. It's time to plant myself firmly on shore.

So here's to a time of reflecting on all that 2015 has brought, but planning to plant my feet and make 2016 my best year yet. I'm not sure yet what that will look like, but I'm starting with this thought:

"Commit your work to the Lord, and your plans will be established" (Proverbs 16:3).

How about you? What has 2015 brought to your life? What are your plans for 2016?

Thursday, December 24, 2015

I hope you have a Christmas Eve service to attend today. If you don't, you might enjoy watching this video of a traditional Christmas Eve Lessons and Carols service at Duke Chapel.

While you're watching, you might see some familiar redheads. My oldest son, Will, reads the ninth lesson. And the rest of us are in the second row. You can't miss my son Preston who is sitting on the aisle--he's the 6'8" redhead.

The video includes all the prelude music as well as the entire service of Lessons and Carols. Enjoy it all or fast forward to the service. It's beautiful!

Tuesday, December 15, 2015

Backing up, here's a view of our house. The grey skies have been par for the course this year, but the Christmas decorations add a cheerful touch.

Before you go any further, you should know that Christmas decorations around here are traditional. Although I admire neutral decor, it simply doesn't satisfy me at Christmastime. I'm a red and green girl all the way.

I love to give our front porch "outdoor living room" some special touches for Christmas.

This year I added a galvanized bucket (found at the Target One Spot) to the side door. I just filled it with with fresh greenery and added some tartan ribbon. I change my chalkboard from time to time; right now it's proclaiming one of my favorite Christmas messages.

Here's a peek inside the front door. I like the house to look Christmasy from the moment you walk in.

The foyer is the hub of this house. The stairs lead up to three bedrooms, but the foyer also connects to my husband's study, the living room, the dining room, and a little hall that leads to the powder room and the master bedroom. So the decor needs to be lovely but pretty simple. This would not be a good place to block traffic. A garland on the banister and some fresh poinsettias add Christmas color and sparkle.

Here's my husband's study with a little Christmas cheer. I don't do a lot in this very masculine room.

Back in the foyer, you can get a good view into the living room, where our one tree stands in the corner. The tree isn't decked with ornaments yet, but it looks pretty with just the lights and the angel on top.

We really live in our living room. It's fairly formal in architecture, but not particularly formal in feel. I left the TV cabinet open for your viewing pleasure. Lots of NFL games are watched on that TV!

The fireplace decorations are simple and sentimental: our stockings collected over the years, a basket of favorite Christmas books, and fresh greenery along with mercury glass candle holders.

This blue bowl stays on the coffee table most of the year. This Christmas I simply added ornaments and an antique Christmas magazine.

The dining room is right next to the living room. I think the French blue color of the walls is a great foil for the red, green, and gold of my Christmas decor.

I love colonial Christmas decorations, and this year I made a Hogarth curve for the dining table. So easy to make and such a lovely centerpiece!

On the other sideboard I display special Lenox Christmas plates. Lenox started its "Trees Around the World" series the year my oldest son was born. I have a plate from the year each of my boys was born, and I love displaying them every Christmas.

Through the dining room is the kitchen, where I've added a few fun Christmas touches. Last year I painted my kitchen island green, so it works especially well for Christmas.

I created a kind of "country store" vignette on top the island with an antique wrapping paper roll, an old scale, and store bell. I made a "Please ring bell for service" sign to sit by the bell. Now if someone would just come serve me when I ring!

In the window I hung my DIY Noel sign and just layered a small boxwood wreath on top. I sometimes remove my DIY faux Roman shades at Christmastime and hang a garland, but this year I felt content with just the Noel sign and wreath. Snowman cookie jars add some fun on either side of the window.

The breakfast area got a bit of Christmas cheer with a simple centerpiece on the table and my Department 56 village on my mother's antique dough cabinet.

My youngest son usually creates a LEGO Christmas village for us, but this year he's away at college. I hope he'll make us a LEGO village before Christmas Day!

The breakfast room leads directly out to the screened porch, which is great fun to decorate for Christmas. I cut a length of flannel fabric straight down the middle: one half I used to create a table runner and from the other half I stitched some Christmas pillows.

Centerpieces don't get much easier than this galvanized bottle holder containing votives (Epsom salts provide the "snow") and some fresh greenery from my yard.

Friday, December 4, 2015

Christmastime is a season of remembering. Some days it can seem that we are caught up like Ebenezer in a visitation of the Spirit of Christmas Past. So it was for me this week, when I headed outside to clip magnolia branches for my Christmas decorations.

I was rudely reminded that I no longer have a magnolia tree in my yard. This past February brought snows and ice storms, and one of the storms took out my prized magnolia. Only through the generosity of neighbors do I have any magnolia leaves this year.

As I snipped a few leaves from a neighbor's tree, suddenly I was once again a new mom, very young and struggling to make ends meet. I lived with my husband and my darling six-month-old son in Michigan, 500 miles away from our families in Tennessee. We had just bought our first house, and I wanted it to look special for Christmas, but my budget was very limited. Naturally, I looked outdoors for greenery to bring inside. And there I stopped, as I realized that there were no big magnolia trees in Michigan. No beautiful waxy leaves to arrange just so atop a mantelpiece or in a windowsill. I had spent all my life in the South, and Christmas just didn't seem like Christmas without magnolia leaves decking the halls.

Early one morning my mother called, as she often did, and I lamented the lack of magnolia leaves. "Hmmm," she said. "I never thought about the fact that magnolias don't grow in Michigan."

"There are lots of magnolias here," I answered, "just not the evergreen kind. Not the grandiflora with the big beautiful leaves that I want."

"Too bad you can't pop down here for a few minutes," Mama mused. "You know Nancy has four huge trees right in her front yard."

Nancy was one of my mother’s best friends, and my mind’s eye pictured the four mature trees that stood just beside her front porch. "Wouldn't that be nice?" I sighed.

Our conversation turned to other topics. Then I hung up the phone and made my way outdoors, where I gathered clippings of pine and fir and yew to fashion into wreaths and swags. My husband and I lit the Christmas tree and the fire and prepared to spend our first holiday season away from the South.

A few days later, a UPS truck stopped in front of my house. The man in brown walked to the door, bearing a huge box and wearing a puzzled expression. As I signed for the package, he shook his head and said, "I can't imagine what could be in this box. It weighs almost nothing."

Puzzled, I accepted the package from him. It was addressed to me, and it was from my mother. I eagerly tore it open to discover branch after branch of magnolia leaves. Each stem was carefully wrapped in damp paper towels and encased in plastic bags, as fresh as if they'd just been cut. With Nancy’s help, Mama had collected dozens of magnolia cuttings, then boxed them up and sent them to me.

It's now been many years since my mother died. I am grateful that I moved back to the South before she left us. I was there when she passed from this life.

Now that I'm safely back in the South, I can collect my own magnolia leaves. But every time I do, I can't help but remember the time that my mother understood how my soul needed a bit of home. And since I couldn't get it for myself, she had it delivered. Via God and UPS.

Tuesday, December 1, 2015

Finally. . . it's December 1! For months we've waited for this, the most wonderful time of the year.

Yesterday, excited about the holiday season, I did what I'll bet millions of other people did: fired up my computer and began perusing my favorite blogs and Pinterest for great ideas. Almost immediately my attention was captured by this headline: "How to Create a Show-stopping. . . ."

This was my Christmas foyer last year. I'm just now starting my Christmas decorating for this year.

Honestly, I can't remember what that particular show-stopping item was. Because almost as soon as I clicked over to read about it, I was filled with a sort of dread that left my heart thumping and my stomach hurting.

At the time, I simply left the computer. I got up and washed the dishes; I folded a load of laundry; I started preparations for dinner. And I felt like a failure. Not a single thing I was doing was show-stopping, and my holiday preparations would be just the same.

Then, with a force that's hard to explain, the truth hit me:

Life isn't a show.It's not a show! So why do I want it to be show-stopping?As we share our lives with one another via our various social media outlets, it's easy for us to lose sight of that fact. We stage and carefully edit our photos. We write catchy headlines and captions. Many times, we include the good stuff and leave out the bad. But life is full of unstaged and unedited scenes. Real life contains the bad as well as the good, the failures as well as the successes, the mediocre as well as the stunning.

You know what? It all counts. Not just the show-stopping, not just the beautiful, not just the pin-worthy. In fact, we often we gain more from our failures than from our successes. We learn and grow as we struggle and wait. We may get more from the daily grind than the yearly hoopla. And honestly, sometimes the messes we make are a greater testimony to the truth than our carefully crafted scenes could ever be. Because the truth is that God is at work. God is alive and full of love, and there's no need for us to try to impress Him--not during the holiday season or at any other time.

So this holiday season, I'm trying to leave my desires to create something show-stopping and enjoy real life. True, it's not always pretty, but if I have eyes to see, ears to hear, and a heart full of gratitude, I can tell it's pretty wonderful.What do you think? Are you ready for a real-life Christmas?

Wednesday, November 25, 2015

In this busy week, when it's tempting to hurtle right past Thanksgiving and rush into Christmastime, I was blessed and inspired by this prayer written by a dear friend of mine. I hope that it will inspire you, as well!

For friends who listen, for opponents who challenge, for companions who love, we thank You, O God. For the gift of laughter, for the warmth of embrace, for the release of tears, we thank You, O God. For dawning and dusk, for the cycle of seasons, for elephants and daisies, and for bodies so wonderfully made, we thank You, O God.

For seedtime and harvest, for nourishing food and pure water, for the luxury of taste and smell, we thank You, O God. For the inspiration for music, for the beauty of the arts, for the fulfillment of human creation, we thank You, O God.

For the miracle of conception and birth, for the ongoing miracles of daily life, for the promise of the life to come, we thank You, O God. For the love and grace we receive, for the gift of Your Son, Jesus Christ, for the constant direction and care You provide us through Your Holy Spirit, we thank You, O God.

In this Thanksgiving season, we take a moment to ponder, to remember, and to number our blessings, knowing that it is through Your divine providence, O God, that we live, and move, and have our being. Amen.
- G. Skramstad

Tuesday, November 17, 2015

If you're like me, you like to set a pretty table for holiday meals such as Thanksgiving and Christmas, but you don't necessarily own enough tableware for large gatherings. I have plenty of china, but I seem to own placemats only in sets of eight.

When I happened upon this product in the wedding supply section of Walmart, inspiration struck. It cost $5.00 a roll.

I measured one of my placemats and decided on a width of 19" per mat. Then I simply cut the runner (it's so easy to cut straight across burlap!)

and fringed both sides. (Just pull out however many strings you like to form a fringe; I pulled five strings on each end).

Voilà! Instant placemat!

Now I can set a pretty table for four or fourteen!

I got a great idea for setting a table for lots of people when I was privileged to attend a bloggers' luncheon at the beautiful home of Shirley of Housepitality Designs. To accommodate more people at the table, she turned her placemats lengthwise and let the ends dangle off the table. Isn't that brilliant? This would work easily with my burlap placemats.

Do you have any tips for setting a pretty table? I'd love to hear them!

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Child of God, apprentice to Jesus, wife of a great guy, and mom of three wonderful sons, I'm a blessed and profoundly grateful woman. I'm also a writer and speaker, and I serve on the Ministry Team and Board of Directors of Renovaré, a ministry dedicated to Christian spiritual formation.

I love blogs for the glimpses they provide into people's lives, so my blog gives you a glimpse into my life--my home, my family, my faith. My prayer is that this blog might impart some grace to you.